Color photographic systems known in the art capture images of scenes on light-sensitive silver halide media or electronic devices, recording the exposing light in analog or digital form, respectively. Following processing, they provide printed hard copy or soft copy output as a visual reproduction of the recorded scene. For example, scene images can be captured on color negative film and then reproduced after chemical development by optical printing, or scanning and electronic writing on photographic paper. Scene images can also be captured on reversal photographic materials, such as slide transparencies, and then be viewed directly by projection or back-illumination, or even be printed onto silver halide photographic paper. In other cases, color images can be captured by electronic devices, such as video cameras or digital still cameras, and viewed on monitors or printed using dye sublimation thermal printers. The systems mentioned above are just some examples of color image recording systems. In each case, these systems produce different appearance characteristics in the color reproduction.
These differing reproduction appearance characteristics are a result of a number of different factors. The final appearance relates to the properties of the scene-recording element (color recording accuracy and signal-to-noise), the system image processing (rendering of hue, colorfulness, lightness, noise, sharpness, and tone scale), and the display form (print, slide or soft copy) with its individual color reproduction gamut, as well as the viewing conditions and the state of adaptation of the viewer. In a traditional photographic system which includes a color negative film and photofinishing involving film development and tail-end processing—and optical printing onto color paper with its subsequent development and tail-end processing—the film tends to dominate the imaging chain properties. Its color recording accuracy, graininess, sharpness enhancement, contrast or gamma, and particularly its chemical interlayer interimage effects, which provide full system color correction and sharpness enhancement, tend to produce a recognizable, characteristic appearance of the final reflection print across all subject matter. The sustained improvement of these individual properties and their aggregate performance has been the basis for marketplace competition in film for decades. Furthermore, the overall limitations of a pure chemical imaging system, particularly around color and tone reproduction, have forced the specialization of films for different applications and induced the marketplace to segment the product category into different lines. Consumers typically select film giving higher print contrast and colorfulness for general-purpose photography, whereas advanced amateurs often prefer films producing more accurate color reproduction with lower contrast. Professional photographers select films for portraiture producing low print contrast and excellent flesh hues, with lower sharpness for a softer, more pleasing look. Should a photographer have mixed subject matter (e.g., portraits, scenic landscapes, and “candid or grab-shots” of people), the film properties will compromise the print reproduction of at least some of the images relative to the selection of a specialized film. This compromise is so significant that Advanced Photo System™ camera designers have made film mid-roll interrupt a premium camera feature so the photographers can remove a partially used film roll and replace it with another better suited to the photographer's changing artistic preference or scene content requirements. The astute photographer knows to select a particular film to achieve a desired characteristic print appearance, or “look”.
Electronic image processing following film scanning or digital still camera capture, new silver halide paper writing devices (e.g., laser writers), and new print methods and media (e.g., inkjet printers and inks) are revolutionizing color reproduction by re-defining print color and tone rendering. The rigid limitations imposed by a pure chemical system of color correction and image structure management with a silver halide print of the prior art have been removed, and many system tone scales, colorfulness levels, hue and lightness renditions, and sharpness levels can be provided using an electronic signal processing chain. Thus it is possible to manipulate the appearance characteristics in an automated photofinishing process by applying mathematical algorithms to the individual image pixel data to provide a scene reproduction having a desired balance of contrast, color saturation and pleasing skin tones as determined by a manufacturer or photofinisher. See for example U.S. Pat. No. 5,528,339 to Buhr et al.
Digital minilab photofinishing systems are beginning to supplement optical printing minilabs in the commercial trade, in part to provide printing services to digital still camera photographers as well as network services to current camera films designed for optical printing. The NORITSU QSS-2711 DLS System uses KODAK DLS Software in order to provide silver halide prints enhanced by electronic image processing that have adjusted contrast, color balance corrected for indoor lighting, and increased print sharpness. It also provides special effects printing, including black-&-white or sepia-toned renditions of color input (e.g., from color recording films or digital cameras) and exaggerated, high-color printing.
The success of such digital image processing to provide one or more pleasing print appearances still depends heavily on the quality of the image capture medium or device. Current photographic image capture films were designed for direct viewing (color reversal) or optical printing (color negative) and are sub-optimal for digitization compared with films designed for scanning and electronic signal processing. U.S. Pat. No. 5,582,961 to Giorgianni et al. describes a color reversal photographic recording material providing colorimetrically accurate scene capture that is intended for scanning and not for direct viewing or optical printing onto silver halide color paper (i.e., a scan film or scan-only film). A viewable image can be obtained by scanning a color negative film that lacks colored masking couplers, as in U.S. Pat. No. 5,698,379 to Bohan et al. or in U.S. Pat. No. 6,021,277 to Sowinski et al., for example. Having been so designed without inherent system color correction properties like optical print films or slide films, a scan film has no acceptable characteristic image reproduction appearance associated with it, and one must be provided by the selection of digital image processing parameters. Providing more than one desirable print appearance from the image data produced from the scan film is not mentioned in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,587,961, 5,698,379 and 6,021,277.
It would be highly desirable to provide photographers with greater control and selection over the look of their pictures derived from a single taking medium, and to enable the convenience of exercising this control after the exposure stage of photography, contrary to the present situation involving silver halide color films intended for optical printing or direct viewing.